Jack the Ripper questions and answers.

Extracts from this document...

Introduction

Jack the Ripper Coursework Laura Unite 11G 1. Describe Law and Order in London in the late nineteenth century. The British Police Force was created in the nineteenth century. The Bow Street Runners were the first and set up in 1749. The Home Secretary, Sir Robert Peel, set up the metropolitan Police Force in 1829 and they became known as the 'peelers' or 'bobbies' after their founder. From the on the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Force was responsible to the Home Secretary. Before Peel set up the Metropolitan Police Force, watchmen and parish constables patrolled the streets of Britsh towns and cities and kept the troublemakers under control. They also prevented disturbances and robberies, and in some cases, riots, which were common in many part of Britain. Although the 'bobbies' duties of dealing with vagrants, prostitutes and drunkenness made the streets more orderly in the second half of the nineteenth century, as the number of street crimes decreased, the number of burglaries increased. This suggests that they were not as effective as they should have been. The functions of the Metropolitan Police Force were to patrol the streets to keep order and prevent crime. Both the Metropolitan Police Force and the army wore 'red-coats' so there was much confusion. As the army had an awful reputation due to frequent deaths of demonstrators, they were distrusted greatly by the British public. At the time the navy were regarded as heroes of Britain, so they chose to wear blue uniforms to distinguish themselves from the army. The force became largely unpopular due to their methods of crowd control; the baton charge used in 1833 at Cold Bath Fields in London resulted in the death of a constable, PC Culley. The County and Borough Act made all counties and boroughs create police forces and it provided annual government grants of 25% to help pay for the cost of police forces. ...read more.

Middle

He then called to a second man, who was on the other side of the road. Schwartz thought that the man was called Lipski. He then ran away because he thought he was going to be followed. Schwartz identified that the woman was Elizabeth Stride, and described both the men. The first man was about thirty years old, and five feet five inches tall. He had dark hair and a dark moustache, and was wearing a dark jacket, trousers and a black cap. The second man, he described, was thirty-five years old and five feet eleven inches tall. He had light brown hair and a moustache. He was wearing a dark overcoat and a black wide-brimmed hat. Finally, James Brown saw Elizabeth Stride talking to a man, although he guessed the time at 12:45am. The man was five feet seven inches tall and was wearing a long dark overcoat. Brown heard Elizabeth say, "Not tonight, some other night." Every one of Jack the Ripper's victims were found dead with their throats cut. However, Elizabeth Stride's body had not been mutilated like in all the other murders. This suggests that the Ripper had been disturbed and fled to avoid being caught. Not long after Stride's body was found, Police Constable Edward Watkins's discovered another body in Mitre Square barely a mile away. Watkins had passed through the square at 1:30am, but when he returned at 1:44am, he found a body lying in the corner. The police then searched the area for clues and found part of the woman's apron in Goulston Street in Whitechapel at 2:55am. On the wall above the apron, written in chalk were the words: The Juwes are The men That Will not Be Blamed For nothing The Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Force, Sir Charles Warren, ordered the writings on the wall to be cleaned off, before they could be photographed and used as evidence. ...read more.

Conclusion

The first was Mr M. J. Druitt, a doctor and of a good family. He disappeared just after Mary Kelly was found dead, and his body was found in the Thames on 31 December 1888, after being in the water upwards of a month. He was sexually insane, and Macnaghten doubted that his family believed that he was the Ripper. The second was Aaron Kosminski, a Polish Jew and resident in Whitechapel. He became insane and hated women greatly, specially prostitutes. He had strong homicidal tendencies and was taken to a lunatic asylum in about March 1889. He was connected to many circumstances, which made him a strong suspect. The third was Michael Strogoff. He was a Russian doctor and a criminal, who was detained in a lunatic asylum as a homicidal maniac. This man's antecedents were of the worst possible type, and his whereabouts at the time of the murders could never be ascertained. Macnaghten drew the conclusions because he believed that the Ripper's final victim was Mary Kelly, because he was in some way prevented from continuing his work further. He believed the reason for this was he became completely deranged. His evidence for this was the way in which Mary Kelly had been murdered, which he thought would have taken about two hours. This made Druitt Macnaghten's prime suspect. After Macnaghten, many other people have tried to discover the identity of the Ripper. A popular suspect was Prince Edward Victor, a grandson of Queen Victoria. However, he had alibis for four of the five murders. At the time of May Kelly's murder he was having dinner with the Queen. Another suspect was Sir William Gull, a royal surgeon. Some people believed he might have murdered the women in his carriage to avoid being caught, although there is nm evidence to prove this theory. The most popular suspect was Francis Tomelty, an American. After the murder of Mary Kelly, he moved back to the USA, where similar murders were committed. However, despite more than a century of investigation, the identity of Jack the Ripper is still unknown. ...read more.

The above preview is unformatted text

This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE History Projects section.

Related GCSE History Projects essays

An extract from Wales in Modern Times by David Evans in 1980, and information from W. Day from Carmarthen to George Cornwall Lewis on the 9th July 1843; talk about the 'tithe'. This used to be a 10% 'tax' of a person's income that was paid to the Anglican Church

It was written by a man while in exile, so the information against her is probably unreliable as all the information was second-hand. Also, if she had produced a catholic heir to the throne this name would never have come about because she was the last Catholic Monarch in history.

It shows how the number of police had increased dramatically from 8 to 294 from the years 1842 and 1884. Also showing the numbers of arrests were dramatically increasing. Therefore we can assume the police were becoming stronger. Additionally with the introduction of the CID, the chances of the police succeeding in catching murderers escalated quickly.

Source E, is an account of the actions of a powerful vigilance committee known as the Baldnobbers. 100 members reportedly broke into a county jail and kidnapped a two-brother gang of recognized outlaws. The Baldnobbers then lynched the brothers. The brothers had been serving a sentence for assaulting a shop owner.

like doctors but if the Ripper planned each murder there would have been harder for the police to catch him because he knew exactly what he was doing. Source D is a description of Jack the Ripper, the description is very vague and not very clear, there are lots of words like 'I think' in there.

A leaflet describing the force-feeding of suffragettes at Walton Gaol, Liverpool, December 1909 This leaflet was given out by the suffragettes and I believe that it may have influenced some members of the public to side with them at the mention of the cruelty and violence that they were persecuted

The differences between source C and A are that source A is a newspaper article which purpose is to sell copies and source C is a report on the body which purpose is to inform the reader. Also source A writes about Martha Tabram and Polly Nicholls whilst source C is the description of the body of Elizabeth Long.

After we got off the ship, we were cleaned and polished with oil so that our skins were shiny and attractive to the buyers. Then we were displayed in the middle of a circle of white buyers, I was feeling very uneasy with eyes staring at us; I hold on to Baako's hand tightly.